Banks, wealthy individuals and businesses can hire private intelligence companies to spy on, harass and discredit their enemies. The intelligence operatives' work for the government protects them from investigation and prosecution. The arrangements are covert and rarely get much media coverage.

Jane Mayer is a well-known investigative reporter who works for The New Yorker and is highly regarded for exposing wrongdoing and miscreant behavior. Her most recent target was the Koch brothers, only this time the target fought back. In a counterattack as sophisticated as their political finance operation, the Kochs hired Vigilant Resources International, a firm run by the former commissioner of the New York Police Department [Howard Safir 1996-2000], to dig up dirt on Mayer.

“ ‘Dirt, dirt, dirt’ is what the source later told me they were digging for in my life. If they couldn’t find it, they’d create it,” Mayer wrote in her new book, Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Radical Right. And create it they did, in the form of plagiarism allegations that were shopped around to news outlets, but with so little evidence that even conservative publications turned them down.

Jeff Stein'sThe Greatest Vendetta On Earth describes how the CEO of Ringling Brothers Circushired former CIA number 3 man Clair George to surveil and play dirty tricks on Janice Pottker, an innocent soccer mom freelance writer. PETA, PAWS and other animal rights organizations were also targeted.

Both of these incidents of intelligence contractors acting as a secret police for private interests were revealed by accident, they were covered up and were not widely reported in the press.

The surveillance tools used by the NSA, FBI, DEA, CIA, etc. are also in the hands of the private intelligence contractors who build and support those systems. How would you feel if your boss, your worst enemy or fiercest rival could spy on you like the NSA, CIA or FBI? If they hire the "right" private investigators, for a price THEY CAN!

Google: Cellphone Spying to see how easily YOU can spy on someone's cellphone. It makes stalking and harassing innocent people much too easy. Understand how it works and protect yourself.